“Accordingly, if a health insurance ID card is not presented (to an immigration officer), that alone cannot be sufficient reason for rejection or denial of a (visa) application,” according to the document.

This passage makes it very clear that not being enrolled in one of Japan’s public health insurance plans cannot of itself be sufficient cause for declining a foreigner’s application for visa renewal or change of status. Please read the entire Immigration document to fully understand the policy.

For more on legal issues, health and visas in Japan, check GaijinPot In Japan pages.  This story is a follow on to a previous post on visa’s in Japan mentioned here.

1.  Proof of Social Insurance to be Required for Visa Renewals, Status Changes

One important new change to Japan’s visa rules is the introduction, from April 1, 2010, of the requirement to provide proof of enrollment in Japan’s Social Insurance programs to be eligible to renew or change visas. Although enrollment in Social Insurance (health, pension) has always been required of all residents, this marks the first time proof of enrollment will be required for visa renewal. There may be some limited exemptions for those on short-term stays from countries with a reciprocal Social Security Agreement with Japan if they can provide evidence of enrollment in their home country’s social security programs.

2.    New Visa Application Forms

The Immigration Department has also revised its visa/COE application forms. The new forms are already available on the Immigration Department website (http://www.immi-moj.go.jp/keiziban/sinnsei-kaisei/nintei/). They will continue to accept the old application forms for a limited time, but eventually these will be phased out.

3.    Government to Issue new Resident Cards for Foreigners

The government also recently announced that they will phase out the current Alien Registration Card system within the next three years and that all foreign residents will be issued a new “Zairyu” Resident Card. This new IC-chipped card will be issued by the Immigration Department, rather than the Ward or City Office and will include information such as; name, date of birth, sex, nationality, address of main residence, status of residence, period of stay, etc.. The card will combine the data currently collected separately under the Immigration Control Act and Alien Registration Law.

Cardholders will be expected to carry their card with them at all times and must report any changes to their employment, residency, or spousal status to the Immigration Department within 14 days or risk fines up to JPY200,000 or imprisonment.

4.    Relaxation of Re-Entry Permit Requirements and Increase to Maximum Period of Stay

Other Immigration Law changes to be implemented within the next 3 years include an extension of the maximum period of stay from the current 3 years to 5 years, and the relaxation of requirements to obtain re-entry permits. Residence Card holders with a valid passport will not be required to apply for a re-entry permit if they are to re-enter Japan within one year of their departure date. More guidance on these changes is expected in the future.

The GaijinPot In Japan Visa pages offer more advice and info for applying and renewing a visa for Japan.

Robert Crane blogs from Solid Japan K.K

The center of gravity for misunderstandings right now is the Fatima Marine Air Station in Okinawa. Long a source of irritation to the citizens of Okinawa and the scene of the crime when a young local girl was assaulted by some service members. It was supposed to go away! However, it seems that this Airfield has a life of its own, so that regardless of the good intentions of Japanese or American negotiators it just plans to stick around.

It’s a noisy place to be sure, but then so are all airbases. This one, however, is in the middle of a densely populated area. It is also a little dangerous because of all the surrounding houses, buildings and schools. Not long ago, a helicopter made an emergency landing in a school yard not far from the base. Naturally, this excited all the mothers whose children were in attendance.

Negotiation, to get the base relocated, have been on-going for years.  The latest was part of a deal to realign and reduce the military presence in Okinawa and in mainland Japan. Everyone including the man on the street agreed and so it was a done deal – signed and delivered. Yet, before the ink on the seals (hankos) was dry each side began sharpshooting the content. Four years later nothing has happened.

The new Japanese government came into office with a pledge to do things differently. They especially want politicians to start running the Government and reduce the role of Bureaucrats. They have cancelled a bunch of projects, mostly dams, which were planned by the previous administration to cut the budget. Interestingly, the budget is bigger than when they started the ax swinging. And, most importantly to the Great Debate issue – they were to move the Futima Air Station out of Okinawa.

The Americans cried foul. We have a deal and you must live up to your part of this bargain. Here is where the culture comes to bear on the problem. Americans think a contract is written in stone. If you try to vary a contract even one inch you’re on your way to court. Big settlements are in the offering. Alas, the Japanese have a very different idea about contracts and many other culturally related behaviors that confuse Westerners. Here then, are a few.

(1)   Speaking your mind. American’s say, “if you have something to say – say it.” To the Japanese this behavior, as far back as a thousand years, was thought to be uncouth and barbarian like. In Kyoto, the Capital, indirect speech was in vogue and has not changed over time.

(2)Appearance and Reality. Americans have no legal system of saying one thing but meaning something else. The Japanese system of tatemae (what I said or what it appears that I mean) and honne (what I really intended or maybe the underlying reality) are completely beyond American and maybe any foreigner capability to understand.

(3)Contracts: As mentioned above American and Europeans believe that a contract is a legal document and must be followed to the letter. There are normally no provisions to renegotiate or change a contract unless such is contained within the contract itself. On the other hand Japanese believe that the contract, if there is a written one which there may not be, was drawn up based on a certain set of conditions. If the conditions change then the contract must change.

The letter takes issue with several key points of the new guidelines – points that both the city of Kobe and Free Choice agree must be satisfactorily addressed.  For one, it questions the ambiguity of the guideline’s newly added provision that “an applicant for visa renewal must be covered by social insurance.”  The guideline does not identify or even address the rules or standards that would be applied should an applicant not be enrolled in the social health plan.  The letter further points out that many foreigners already carry private medical insurance and acknowledges that such plans can in many cases do a better job of covering many of the problems typically faced by foreigners, such as emergency family reunion expenses for serious illness or injury and repatriation of remains in the event of death.  It also alludes to the guidelines’ silence on how such individuals are to be treated.

Kobe City has strong international heritage.  It openly welcomes the foreign community, and has also worked diligently to attract foreign companies.  By offering lower city taxes and other measures, it has created a zone friendly to outside businesses.  The city is also well known for the large biotechnology sector that is housed on its Port Island and its active recruitment of foreign researchers to come and work there.

Chairman Yoshida and the Kobe City Assembly do not feel that the new Immigration guidelines are in the best interest of their city.  They can foresee the potential detriment to their foreign community and, ultimately, to their city as a whole.  We at Free Choice wholeheartedly applaud their stance. To find out more about Kobe’s stance on this issue, please visit:

http://www.freechoice.jp/kobe.asp

Why is this a bad idea?

The guideline was intended to compel employers to observe the law by enrolling their employees in social insurance. However, it puts foreigners between a rock and a hard place because their employers may force them to join the national health plan instead. Foreigners not previously on the social system would have to pay up to two years of back premiums – up to five in some cities. Such action would undoubtedly force many honest and hard-working foreigners to leave Japan, while coercing dishonest or otherwise-legal foreigners “underground.” Ironically, this is precisely the opposite of the intended effect of the newly passed Immigration laws that seek to curtail foreigners from overstaying their visas.

The guideline is too ambiguous and a violation of human rights . . .

It does not specifically state whether foreigners who are not able to enroll in social insurance will be denied visa renewal or if they would instead be required to join the national health plan in order to qualify for extension. It gives individual Immigration officials complete and total discretion in determining whether or not to renew a visa – discretion based solely on personal judgment rather than on concrete principles or instructions.

The Free Choice Foundation will therefore petition the government under Article 16 of the Japanese Constitution to revoke the new guideline.

Please join our online petition drive at:

http://www.FreeChoice.jp

We welcome your support

Have you heard the story about the Japanese Elementary School Teacher who was giving a lecture on the Great Pacific War when one of his students raised his hand? Yes, the teachers, said. The boy asked teacher (Sensei),” Did we have a war with America?” “Why, yes,” the teacher replied. “Oh, who won?” said the student. Duh!

A favorite saying of Americans since the time of Donald Rumsfeld, was Secretary of Defense, is that, “We don’t know what we don’t know.”

I’m a news junkie. I watch the evening news on several different Japanese stations every night, even though my language ability is about Kindergarten level. A couple of weeks ago  I thought I understood the talking head to say that American Soldiers in Japan were living very high on the hog – all paid for by the hard working Japanese tax payer.

I’ve been around the American military for a very long time and I know that when you have to roll out of the sack at 5AM and go for some vigorous physical exercise before breakfast, that’s not high on the hog. It did; however, start me to wondering how many Japanese people believe what I thought I heard this fellow say. Maybe, they don’t know what they don’t know.  How could I find out the truth? Go ask some people, I said to myself. So I did.

TAXI DRIVER:  Question.  Why do you think the American military are here in Japan?

Answer.  I don’t know, but they make a lot of noise. I live by an airbase and it is so noisy that I can’t sleep. I work at night, you know. So I say they are here to make noise.

PEDESTRIAN # 1 (Middle age lady). Question. Why do you think the American military are in Japan?

Answer.  That’s easy. They want to date Japanese girls. I see them all the time. Everyone seems to be having fun. Very nice and they seem to be gentlemen, too. Do you know any my age, she asked?

SHOP KEEPER. Question. Why do you think the American military are in Japan?

Answer. I  don’t know, but they buy stuff that no Japanese would buy so its O.K. by me.

OFFICE WORKER. Question. Why do you think the American Military are in Japan?

Answer. Yes, I heard about that. They all have Japanese employees as dog walkers, bar tenders, bowling ball hole drillers and so on. They must be living a very easy life, at my expense. And they have big houses with lawns and parking for two cars while I live in a rabbit hutch and pay for their luxury living. Not fair, I say!

BUSINESS MAN. Question. Why do you think the American military are in Japan?

Answer. Let me tell you. In the late Tokogawa era there was a motto, “honor the Emperor and drive out the barbarians.” That sounded nice but proved impractical. Then, as now, it’s all about money and business. With the advent of the Meji era we started doing business with the so called barbarians and look at Japan today. There are hundreds of American Companies in Japan and hundreds of Japanese companies in America. The American military are here to defend their business interests and I don’t mind because they are defending mine too.

As you can see, I was getting answers that covered the Pacific Ocean and beyond. Fortunately, I had written down all of these people’s names and telephone numbers. I decided to invite them all to a round table discussion about a new subject. The new subject would be “What do you know about the US/Japan Treaty of Cooperation and Security?”

Where would I have such a meeting? I decided on neutral ground. A park in Tokyo would do nicely.

I took along my friend Douglas because he likes to debate and a first class interpreter so there would be no misunderstanding. This was overkill because none of them had even heard of the US/Japan Treaty of Cooperation and Security. Finally, the Taxi Driver said, “I saw on TV news that we Japanese taxpayers are spending $5 billion to support the US Military and I think that is too much.” Douglas immediately countered with, “How much do you think the American taxpayers are spending for Submarines and Aircraft Carriers to defend Japan?”

Hushed silence fell over the group!

The business man finally spoke up. It’s all about money and business. What is $ 5 Billion or 5 smillion? Who cares? Probably one Aircraft Carrier cost that much when you add in the operating expenses and salaries. This caused a ruckus. Blah, Blah, Blah and some angry Blah, Blah, Blah.

It was getting dark and I wanted to bring this to a close. The Treaty of Cooperation and Security is a Government to Government agreement whereby the US agreed to defend Japan but Japan did not agree to defend the US, I told the assembled group. If you don’t remember anything else from this discussion please keep in mind that they (US) are here at the request of the Japanese Government – to defend Japan. These Americans may be loud, smelly, fat and rude, but they are ready to give their life in the defense of your country. HOOAH !

- payment of medical fees at international clinics in Japan
- family reunion expenses in the event of serious illness
- medical and/or political evacuation
- repatriation of remains in the event of death
- comprehensive international coverage
- payment of pharmaceuticals not covered by public insurance

These needs are not at all unreasonable for expatriates. While we fully understand the government’s concern that foreigners have insurance protection, we cannot condone expatriates being forced onto public insurance by means of immigration policy, a tactic that ignores their needs and takes the humanity out of medicine.  The Free Choice Foundation will therefore petition the Japanese government under Article 16 of the Constitution to revoke the new guideline.

Please visit the Free Choice website for more information. While there, we invite you to join our online petition drive by sharing your comments on the “Declare Your Support” form.

We welcome your support!

www.freechoice.jp

What is an action director?

There’s a lot of different titles for people  who are responsible for creating a fight scene; the action director, the stunt coordinator, the fight coordinator, etc, so it’s easy to get confused. An action director is like the overseer. They are the ones who have to think about the drama portrayed by the action, the camera angles, the editing, and the sound.

How is an action director different from a stunt coordinator?

The stunt coordinator is the person responsible for making a scene that could be potentially dangerous real, and yet safe enough to execute. The action director thinks about the image of the scene from the script, and how it pertains to the movie.

Why are there no ‘action directors’ in the west?

The position of the action director is something that was developed in Hong Kong. In HK, the director and the action director works together. During the filming of dangerous scenes, the AD would have all the say. (Although it’s quite common for A.D.s to transition into directing as well.)The position of the action director started in Japan about 10 years ago, but it still isn’t really recognized in Hollywood.

Once Hollywood took an interest in the HK style of fight scenes, they tried to only import Hong Kong’s most talented stunt men, but it didn’t necessary work. Next, they tried to import action directors but they gave them credit as other things instead of recognizing the position. Even Yuen Woo Ping,who worked on the Matrix and is  one of HK’s most reknowned action directors, still isn’t credited as such in the film.

What are some of the challenges unique to directing action in Japan?

A lot of directors in Japan conceive of the action and the drama as separate things instead of seeing them as both integral parts of the film as a whole. They aren’t good at integrating the action scenes into the story.

If there’s action and drama in the same film, oftentimes the action is seen as holding less value, and the action sequences will be the first thing to get cut.

Sometimes a film will start off with multiple fight scenes, but the director will cut out the action sequences claiming that the bottom line is just that the good guy kills the bad guy.  For us as action directors however, the fight scenes are as important and as potentially emotion envoking as the dramatic scenes; and how the good guy kills the bad guy is just as important to the story as why he’s doing it.

Another challenge we face is that ,Japan, having the island mentality that it does, film makers always concentrate on making films that will appeal to the Japanese market, and aren’t as outward looking as film-makers in Korea or Hong Kong. That’s one reason why there hasn’t been a major international action hit here.

If they do want to make something to sell internationally, usually they try to make something that reflects Japanese culture so they go the route of history films instead of action.

This is our challenge as action directors here- to push the envelope of creating entertaining films that can reach farther audiences.

Do you prefer working on Japanese action films or international ones?

It’s easier to work in foreign movies. They allow you to spend more time because they have a bigger budget. At times, for something that should take a month or two to film we only have 2 weeks . Also, as a function of smaller budgets, the economics of the filming are often considered more important than the creation of true entertainment value.

Have you always wanted to simply be a director? Was there ever a time that you wanted to be an action movie star yourself?

Of course. Like a lot of people in Japan’s action industry, I got into it during the ‘Kung Fu Boom’ because I wanted to be like Jackie Chan or Jet Li. I started making Indy films with my friends (See Sample) and as we produced the films, I’d spend hours and hours studying Hong Kong films to see how we could produce fight sequences with the same level of quality.  In doing so, I realized that every action director has a certain taste, a flavor.  The same actor with the same martial arts ability can look completely different depending on the action director they are working under. The more I learned, the more exciting the process of creation became for me, and eventually, it outweighed my desire to be in the films myself.

What do you see for yourself and U’den in the future?

I don’t want to create a huge action team per se. The future vision that I have for Uden is for it to simply be a group of ‘creators’ who can work without borders and integrate different elements of film with action.

When people fight, there is always a reason that they are fighting. The more meaning the fight has, the harder hitting the impression needs to be. In the future, I hope that we can develop and pioneer new ways of expressing this idea.

Yuji Shimomura is the head action director at U’den Flameworks, and is one of the first action directors in Japan. He has worked on over 50 films to date in Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, New Zealand, and Romania. Death Trance, (which I had the honor of appearing in myself) was his directing debut, and a smash hit internationally. Recently, I also had the honor of working under him again in the short film, Yassy.

English/Japanese Interpretation by Ichiro Gutierrez

]]> http://blog.gaijinpot.com/legal/the-art-and-the-science-of-action-directing-interview-with-yuji-shimomura/2850/feed/ 0 http://blog.gaijinpot.com/legal/bye-bye-job-hello-gov%e2%80%99t-bureaucracy/1854/ http://blog.gaijinpot.com/legal/bye-bye-job-hello-gov%e2%80%99t-bureaucracy/1854/#comments Tue, 14 Apr 2009 21:15:59 +0000 Alex Farrell http://blog.gaijinpot.com/?p=1854 Since this is my first blog entry, I’d like to express my thanks to you for at least reading this sentence, and say that this blog’s angle will be to offer practical advice and insights from the perspective of a long-time foreign resident in Japan. I’ve been here since February 2003, it’s been a great experience overall, and I hope you will be able to say the same after a few years here, too.

Anyway, getting right into it, if you’ve been a foreign resident in Japan for more than a few years like myself, you’ve probably gone through your fair share of employers. In this economy, with companies cutting back on everything from employee development (English teachers) and marketing (Japanese to [insert language] translators), and with foreign travel to Japan on the decline (for those of you in the hospitality industry), you may have found yourself “restructured” as they say here in Japan-in other words, laid off and out of a job.

So is it time to pack your bags and head back to your homeland? Well, the job market may be even worse there, so perhaps not. What about unemployment benefits? Can you even get those in Japan? Yes, indeed you can, if you’ve been paying into Employment Insurance (Koyou Hoken) for one continuous year while employed in a job that had you regularly working 11 days or more per month. The government requires that your employer deduct this payment from your monthly pay, and if they didn’t, then you better head over to Hello Work right now and rat them out so you can get the money that is now due to you.

Hello Work (officially called the Employment Security Bureau) is the place with the funny name where you can find a job after your previous employee said “Sayonara” to you. Here’s the Tokyo branch’s horribly translated English site, as well as a far more useful chart showing when an interpreter speaking the language of your choice is available at an office near you. Anyway, I’ve been through the process of receiving benefits twice myself, the first time when the English school I was working at went bankrupt just 11 days after my wedding and I found to my surprise that I only had 25,000 yen in my account on payday, the day before rent. That sucked. What made it suck even more was finding out that I couldn’t get benefits right away, but that it would take a couple months or so. In the end though, things worked out okay. A colleague of mine from that time gave up applying because he found it too much of a bureaucratic hassle-which it is-but he missed out on over 500,000 yen to supplement his part-time income over the next few months!

You see, the way it works is you are eligible for up to a certain number of days’ worth of benefits until you either use them all up or a prescribed period of time elapses. This all varies with what your previous income was, age and other factors, but in my case I was 26 and had had a monthly income of less than 300,000 yen. I got 90 days’ worth of benefits valid for one year, all of which I used. I say “worth” because if, for example, you work four days in a week, then for that week you get three days’ worth of benefits (including weekends and national holidays), while the other four days you didn’t use you can take some other time. This means that with the right part-time jobs that have high hourly rates (but maybe lots of prep or travel time) or cash-in-hand work like teaching private lessons, combined with your unemployment benefits, you can end up making a decent amount of money while you figure out what to do once the cash from the government runs out. My 90 days’ worth lasted me a good five months. (Note that if you report an average of 20 or more hours worked per week, you may become ineligible to receive further benefits.)

By the way, if you’re in or near the Tokyo area and you’ve got visa problems on top of your employment woes, you’ll be glad to know that the government has set up “One Stop Centers” to deal with both employment and immigration issues for foreign residents.

So what should you do during this time? Lots of people in the U.S. are going back to school, though I can’t fathom how they’re paying for it since everyone over there is supposed to be broke. If you’re staying in Japan for a while, do yourself a favor and brush up on your Japanese. It is essential if you ever want to get out of being confined to teaching English, proofreading and headhunting, all of which are generally dead-end careers. In fact, that’ll be the topic I take up next time when I begin addressing the “English Teacher Trap.”

Good luck!

http://www.proz.com/translator/786770

Also exposed is how Japan’s hotels aren’t keeping their legal promises.  They’re snaffling tax breaks for registering with the GOJ to offer international service – without actually offering any.

Two articles (AP and Mainichi) follow.  Comment from me afterwards:

Ministry seeks faster entry procedures for foreigners at airports
March 2, 2009, Associated Press

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D96M81NG1&show_article=1

Ministry says Japan needs to become more tourist-friendly
Mainichi Shinbun March 3, 2009

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/news/20090303p2a00m0na012000c.html?inb=rs

COMMENT:  First, love those last paragraphs in both the AP and Mainichi articles, about how hotels aren’t enforcing international standards they’ve agreed to.

Let’s do the math: 40% of 1560 member hotels is 624 hotels with no foreign-language service, whatever that means. Moreover, according to the AP, 41% of those 624 hotels couldn’t be bothered to put up even a foreign-language sign (how hard could that be?). That means 256 hotels are accepting the international registry advertising, along with concomitant breaks on property taxes, but not doing their job.

Weak excuse time: Some accommodations have claimed they turn away NJ simply because they don’t feel they can provide NJ with professional service, as in service commensurate with their own standards (sources here and here). As if that’s the customer’s problem? Oh, but this time there’s no excuse for those shy and self-effacing hoteliers. They’re clearly beckoning NJ to come stay through the International Sightseeing Hotel Law.

But the rot runs deep. As Debito.org reported last year, we’ve even had a local government tourism board (Fukushima Prefecture) as recently as 2007 (that is, until Debito.org contacted them) advertising hotels that won’t even ACCEPT foreigners. (Yes, the tourism board knew what they were doing: they even offered the option of refusal to those shy hotels!) You know something is really screwy when even the government acquiesces in and encourages illegal activity . (You can’t turn away guests just because they’re foreign, under the Hotel Management Law.)

And that’s even before we get to the MOJ’s ludicrous and discriminatory fingerprinting system (targeting “terrorists”, “criminals”, and carriers “infectious diseases”, which of course means targeting not only foreign tourists, but also NJ residents). It has made “Yokoso Japan” visits or returns home worse than cumbersome. The ministries are tramping on each other’s toes.

Do-nothing bureaucratic default mode time: Honpo Yoshiaki, chief of the Japan Tourism Agency, in an Autumn 2008 interview with the Japan Times and a Q&A with Nagano hotelier Tyler Lynch, diffidently said that those hotels that don’t want NJ (and an October 2008 poll indicated 27% of hotels nationwide didn’t) will just be “ignored” by the ministry.

Yeah, that’ll fix ‘em. No wonder MOIA is miffed. Sic ‘em.

Arudou Debito in Sapporo

http://www.debito.org